Chapter Three

Mother told us that when Akunna was born, she didn't cry instead she appeared like someone who had seen life before and had found nothing to be of interest. The only thing she had done when she was pinched by the doctor was to wince and then 'forced' herself to cry just so they knew she was alive. That was how mother had put it. When she had come home from the hospital, she had been calm and sometimes mother would pinch her to know if she was alive when she stayed calm for too long that it seemed threatening.

But as she grew, she became a talker and very authoritative and sometimes very recalcitrant that it seemed all she did was to anger our parents at the slightest opportunity especially mother but she always ignored.

Akunna came back later at night after dinner was prepared and father was watching the news on Channels. She was looking anything but sorry as she stepped into the parlour.

"Good evening sir." She greeted Father and he hmmed in response.

"Welcome." I said. "Thank you." And with that she walked into the room.

"Are you really watching this news?" I asked Father.

"Of course, we should be informed the way things are going."

"I would rather not be."

"Why?"

"No news is good news." I replied.

"No news is anxiety. " Father responded.

"Whereas, there is not a single good news to get from these news station the way the country is going."

"It's not their fault, at least they are better than NTA."

"Any station is better than NTA, father."

"I told these people that Mohammadu Buhari will be the death of us but they were shouting 'sei baba', now see how things have become worst."

"I don't even get why you the elderly people would vote him in after how he ruled as a military head of state." I said. Just like Father, I never supported Buhari. The man to me had nothing to offer and we would go on later to regret more of his tenure as president with the endsars protest and the killings and kidnapping of school children which would become order of the day but at that moment, the recession was what was affecting us all, the gradual but continuous inflation of the prices of goods at the market.

When I walked into the room I and Akunna shared later in the night, I had the intention to fall on my bed and doze off but I knew I had to talk to her at least. She was on her own bed, one hand behind her head and the other hand scrolling through her phone.

"Aku." I called her, shortening her name.

"What?" She replied stiffly.

"What is the problem?" I sat on my bed and stared at her, hoping she would get the message that I wanted to talk to her and really know what was wrong but even if she got it, she remained on the bed with her phone in hand.

"How do you mean?" She asked back like she had no idea.

I sighed. "What is the problem, what happened to you, why the sudden change? You and Father used to be so close that I envied you but now things has suddenly changed and all you do is keep looking for ways to make him scream and get angry." I said voicing these words out like I had rehearsed them, waiting to ask her all these while because there has to be a reason things suddenly changed in this house.

"He is the one who wants to get angry. He should let me be and peace would reign."

"Why don't you try listening to him."

"I don't want to get married to Chief Justice's son."

"I'm not only talking about the myriads of marriage proposals you have turned down but it's almost like you just want to keep going against everything he says."

She dropped the phone on the bed and stared at the ceiling.

"Ama I don't owe you any explanation, go and ask them what they did to me first."

"What did they possibly do to you to warrant all these commotion and continuous unrest in this house. Things weren't like this before, there was peace and love and calm...."

"There have never been those things you mentioned. This house has always been like this. The peace and love and calm you think had been were all make believe. The war has been raging before you were born but Father and Mother had buried it in a pot and sat on it for so long pretending like all is well but now it has blown in their faces." She spoke like a possessed person and I was disturbed.

"I don't understand; what do you mean?"

"Don't worry, with time, you will understand. Time will reveal all truth." She turned towards the wall and I knew the conversation has ended.